


in this night-soaked bed

by singlemalter



Category: Formula 1 RPF
Genre: Fluff, Implied Sexual Content, Insecurity, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-04
Updated: 2020-01-04
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:54:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22110541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/singlemalter/pseuds/singlemalter
Summary: Flicking the switch can be easy.
Relationships: Lando Norris/Carlos Sainz Jr
Comments: 9
Kudos: 123





	in this night-soaked bed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [babypapaya](https://archiveofourown.org/users/babypapaya/gifts).

“Can we turn the lights back on, actually?”

Time freezes for a second. “What?” Lando asks, though he’s absolutely sure he heard that right.

“I wanted to see you,” Carlos says. His hand is cradling Lando’s cheek, and he must be able to feel the spots scattered all over his traitorous skin, and God, it’s so damn ridiculous, but Lando wants to bury in a hole and hide.

He’s been putting off lights-on sex with his boyfriend for weeks, because he can’t cope with the mortifying ordeal of being known. His brain shuts down completely whenever Carlos compliments him, as though Lando is anything but slightly below average, and jury’s still out on any racing-related compliments—he’s smart enough to know not anyone can get to F1, fine, but is he really the next Lewis Hamilton? _The Sun_ and maybe Zak seem to think so. Lando doubts it.

Gently, he guides Carlos’ hand away from his face, leaving it on his thigh instead. He wants to be touched, just not _there_, not while he’s mulling over all the ways in which his looks are unworthy of this burning kind of love.

“I just, um, do we have to?”

“No, no, of course not,” Carlos rushes to explain. Guilt swirls in Lando’s stomach; good going, make your boyfriend feel bad for wanting to see you while you fuck. “I just think you are beautiful, and I like to look at your face when you are all—you know how you get, twisting around like you are trying to run away from me.”

Lando’s cheeks burn. They’ve been together for a solid couple of months now, yet his stupid, useless head can’t wrap itself around the fact this is real. Carlos wants him, embarrassingly skinny body and all, and it’s… mindblowing.

“I know,” Lando amends. He wants to look in Carlos’ eyes, but, well. That would imply doing the very thing he’s trying to avert right now. “I know, I know, I just—”

“Are you crying?”

“No,” Lando croaks, definitely crying. He takes his hands off Carlos’ broad, stupidly hot shoulders, wrapping them around his own skinny frame. The comparison weighs heavy on his heart. “I just… I don’t know, I don’t know what to do, it’s so dumb and I’m making a big deal out of freaking nothing.”

“It isn’t nothing if it is making you cry, Lando,” Carlos says, and he’s doing the thing in which his accent completely skips over the D in Lando’s name. It’s almost too much, too soft to bear.

“I know,” Lando repeats. He’s going in circles, a desperate attempt to hide how pathetic he feels, but it’s no use. He knows Carlos will pry it out of him—it’s better to just get it over with. “I don’t like the way I look.”

“I know that,” says Carlos. His finger draws circles on the warm skin of Lando’s thigh, soothing. “And I want to look at you when we have sex, fuck, make love, whatever it is, when we do it, I want to see you, so I can tell you that I think you are beautiful.”

Warmth. Safety. This is what love must, or better, _should_ feel like, Lando thinks. It’s like he’s been hungering and thirsting for Carlos in every cranny of his soul, even in his ribs. “You are so good to me,” he whispers.

“Less than you deserve, that’s for sure. One hundred percent, you deserve everything in the world. I want to give it to you, and I am trying. So much.”

Leaning forwards, Lando runs his hands over Carlos’ chest. “I love you,” he says.

When Carlos reaches up to wipe the stray tears away, Lando laughs, fighting off the urge to bury his face in the crook of Carlos’ neck. He’s still nervous, even if it’s subdued, but a spark of courage blooms deep in his stomach, and shit, he’s really doing this, isn’t he?

Lando presses a kiss to Carlos’ forehead and pulls away. Then he fumbles blindly until his hand hits the switch on the wall. 

His first thought once the lights flicker on is that he can’t see shit. It’s mildly comforting, because that means Carlos can’t see him, either. After a while, though, he’s left with nothing but his own body, and fear creeps up his back—_have I fucked this up_, he wonders. _Did I just ruin one of the best things I’ve got going for myself?_

As if sensing his anxiety, Carlos crawls forwards and kisses him on the mouth, framing his face with both hands. “I cannot believe you were so afraid,” he says, laughter creeping into his voice. “Just look at you. You are the most perfect thing I have ever seen in my whole life.”

Lando promptly ignores the suggestion, because okay, he’s not there yet; if he’s honest, he might never be. But in this moment, he wants to be held by the light, to be a tree drinking the rain, and he grins against Carlos’ lips, sinking deeper into the love he’d thought he’d never receive. 

**Author's Note:**

> Title by Jeanette Winterson: “When I hold you in this night-soaked bed it is courage for the day I seek. Courage that when the light comes I will turn towards it. It couldn’t be simpler. It couldn’t be harder.”
> 
> “If we want the rewards of being loved we must submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known.” Tim Kreider for NYT.
> 
> “Why was I waiting for you? Hungering and thirsting for you in every cranny of my soul and even in my ribs?” Fyodor Dostoevsky, _The Brothers Karamazov_.
> 
> “To be held by the light was what I wanted, to be a tree drinking the rain,” Linda Hogan, _To Be Held_. 
> 
> Thank you to my Loving Boyfriend for telling me this was good, even though it’s super wooby.
> 
> Inspired (thus gifted to) by babypapaya’s fic, specifically the skincare saga, which spawned the PERFECT BRAND OF WOOBY LANDO. Thank you.
> 
> singlemalter, Tumblr.


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